Awnings constitute an accessory available for use with most mobile homes, house trailers, campers or other recreational vehicles, often designated as RVs. The awnings are retractable so that they can be stored on the outer surface of the recreational vehicle when not in use. To protect the awning while it is being stored, a cover portion of one type or another is used. Generally, the awning is rolled onto a spring-wound, storing core, much like a "roll-up" window shade. The core onto which the awning is wound customarily is located at the outboard end of the awning and winds toward the recreational vehicle to which it is attached until the entire awning is wound onto the core in juxtaposition with the side of the recreational vehicle. As such, that portion of the awning that constitutes the last layers or layers of the awning to be wound onto the core serve as a cover for the remainder of the awning when so stored.
It has heretofore been attempted to employ a plastic sheet as the inboard terminal section of the awning so that as the inboard terminal sections wind onto the storing core it serves to cover and protect the remainder of the awning. Such prior cover portion when made of flexible polyvinyl chloride plastic or the like and when subjected to higher temperatures such as those present with direct sun, have a tendency to shorten, or buckle, in the longitudinal direction of the awning--i.e., parallel to the longitudinal axis of the vehicle to which it is secured. This longitudinal shrinkage, or buckling, also occasions lateral elongation of the cover.